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9.8.07

Restarting An Echeveria

I picked up this "Black Prince" Echeveria back in November of '06 after I spotted it in a new shipment of succulents at a local Home Depot. Unfortunately this Echeveria started to become a little leggy which is understandable because of the low light conditions indoors over the winter.

Note the difference in the leaf spacing in the first photo above. The top portion of the Echeveria is more compact compared to the leaves on the bottom of the plant. The growth at the top of the plant occurred when spring arrived and I set the plant out in full sun, the lower parts occurred indoors during winter when there wasn't enough light for this plant.

Some indoor gardeners wouldn't be bothered by a leggy succulent but I had been wanting to add this one to my collection for a long time and to me the leggy growth shows bad plant husbandry on my part. Solving this problem will be easy because I can propagate this Echeveria through "cuttings."

The first thing I did was removed the lower leaves of the Echeveria by pulling them from the spot where they are attached to the stem of the plant. I then set the leaves to the side and allowed them to dry for two or three days so they can callous-over. The second thing I did was cut the top portion of the succulent making sure to leave a stem below the bottom leaf, I also set that aside for a couple of days to allow the cut to heal then I simply inserted the top half into a new pot with soil in a shady area of my porch so that the sun doesn't dry it out.

If you look at the second image you can see that new growth has started to appear after a couple of days from where I removed the leaves. In time the bare stem will put out enough new growth that I could get a couple more plants from it. The top portion that I cut and set in soil to root will provide me a with fresh and good looking plant and the leaves I removed will eventually root providing me with many more new plants. For information on propagating succulents through leaf cuttings you can read my previous post titled Plant Propagation: Succulents by Leaf Cuttings.

9 comments:

Again great information, Echeverias are something I really miss now living in the Northwest. When living in So. Calif. I use to have pots of them all over my deck and patios. I have sepervirums up here, which are great (and hardy) but not quite the same. I always appreciate your very informative posts, BOB

Great post! I'm not into echevias and their kind, and I realise now that's partly because I seldom have the patience to let them dry out when I try to get cuttings from them (in general I'm over watering them too).

Thank you for this tip - This is what happens to many of my succulents during the winter months, even though they are on windowsills and getting lots of winter sun. I guess it just isn't enough. Now I know what I can do with them in the spring!

Hi there great site! I am currently propagating my Echiveria. I have around 6 tiny leaves I've pulled off the main healthy one. 2 of them are rooting in the air. Sitting on soil. My fear is not knowing if and how much water to give them. Right now the soil is verrrrry dry. As one who tends to love their plants too much I am restraining from immediatley watering them. Help!! When do I water freshly rooting cuttings?

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